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Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Thank you London.

at the nastiest, cheapest hostel in London. This photo just so happens to be the very first photo we took together that rainy, December night. :)

One of my best friends from Tampa; Katie flew to Barcelona about a week before Christmas for us to embark on our very first "let's backpack around Europe" trip. WHAT AN AMAZING EXPERIENCE!

Our first stop was Amsterdam.. And then on to London to meet my roommate at the time; Lucy at her sisters apartment since her sister lived in London and Lucy wanted to show us around. We had a perfect weekend exploring the city but on our last night there Lucy had to take a train back to her hometown for Christmas therefore we had to find our own sleeping arrangement that night. We obviously went for the cheapest hostel (around 20 pounds) and upon arriving we quickly realized you pay for what you get. It was ONE large room with atleast 30 (yes 30) beds combined with men and women. I'm not exaggerating when I say it it smelled as bad or worse than a locker room.

About an hour after arriving, we were sitting on our beds trying to figure out what we were going to do next.. When a cute Spanish boy popped his head around the corner asking (in his broken English at the time) if the hostel provided lockers to keep our stuff in.. And the rest is history..

Really though! We quickly found out he was from Barcelona and ended up spending the rest of that day and night wandering around the streets of London with our new friend Carles. The next day he even walked us to the train station (which was about an hour away) and we said our "see ya laters" as we knew we would definitely see him again, we just weren't sure where. He ended up cutting his trip in London short and changing his flight to meet Katie and I as well as 2 other friends we had met up with at this point in Bologna, Italy. To this day we still talk about how crazy the whole story sounds when explaining it..

The next four days were spent eating lots of gelato, sleeping in a few more (not so smelly hostels), teaching Carles lots of English slang, and trying to read Italian maps as we (Katie, Kristin, Will, Carles, and myself) explored Bologna, Florence, and Rome. It was an amazing end to my first Eurotrip.

Obviously, Carles and I remained friends as we got settled being back in Barcelona and eventually (in April of 2013) he moved in with me and Lucy as he was looking to move out of his parents house. In the beginning of May we decided to make things "official" and it's been an amazing ride since then. We have had ups and downs and rocky roads due to the fact living 4,000 miles away from eachother isn't easy..

However, I am SO thankful and SO lucky to have met this man 2 years ago and can't wait to see what the future has in store for us.